The Guesthouse

by Abbie Frost

  ‘He could be lying about that.’ Rosa licked her lips. ‘Maybe he’s hidden them, I wouldn’t put it past him. Just doing it to get attention. Or maybe, he doesn’t want anyone to leave.’

  There was a moment of silence.

  ‘Come on!’ Hannah laughed. ‘Are you serious? Why would he do that? Why take the food, when he can eat whatever he wants?’

  Rounding on her, Rosa began to shout. ‘Of course you’d defend him.’ She stabbed a finger at Hannah. ‘In fact, now I think of it, I wouldn’t be surprised if it was you.’ A bitter laugh. ‘You took the car keys to keep him here.’

  The door opened and Hannah bit back her anger. She took a deep breath, as they all turned to see Sandeep and Mo. No one spoke. Mo and Sandeep stood on the opposite side of the table from the others.

  Mo gave them a tight-lipped smile.

  ‘Yes, Rosa,’ Sandeep said. ‘I heard what you said.’ He stared at her. ‘And I have my own theory. You see, I think there’s someone here who wants – who needs – everyone to stay. I think it’s someone who can’t bear the thought of being left here on their own, who feels abandoned and lonely and will do anything – absolutely anything – to avoid embarrassment. That’s right, it’s you. You have to stay until that useless husband of yours gets back, if he ever does.’

  Chloe put her face in her hands and began to cry.

  ‘Please, Sandeep,’ Hannah said. ‘You’re upsetting Chloe.’

  But Sandeep and Rosa stood deadly still, their eyes locked. Eventually he spoke again, his voice gruff.

  ‘You’re the one who wants us to stay, the one desperate enough to take the car keys. So what is it, Rosa? Tell us. Why keep us at this bloody house?’

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  The room seemed to spin on its axis, and Hannah reached out to grab at the wall, holding herself steady. The sounds of the others shouting droned on around her, muffled and distant now. As if she were back in the bath upstairs, being pushed down, sliding deeper and struggling to hear or to breathe. She thought about those horrible nightmares, about all that had happened over the past few days. It was like a dream, like getting so shitfaced that you lost yourself for a few hours. She needed someone like Lori now, someone to drag her back out of the abyss and take her home to clean up the mess she had made.

  Maybe that was it, maybe it was the booze after all. She’d given it up too quickly, hadn’t weaned herself off it, and this was just her body telling her never to drink again.

  The room stopped spinning and she opened her eyes. The colours returned to normal. She was leaning back against the wall, her legs weak. No one was paying her any attention; they were all focused on Rosa and Sandeep.

  Mo was speaking, his palms raised. ‘Calm down, both of you.’ He turned to Sandeep. ‘Look, Dad, you can’t just start accusing people for something that’s my fault. I’ve just lost the keys – they haven’t been stolen – and I’m fed up with your paranoia. Sick of you complaining all the time.’

  Sandeep breathed heavily for a moment. ‘Paranoid? An old fool, a joke. So that’s it, is it? That’s what you think of me.’ He sighed. ‘I’m going up to my room.’ When Mo didn’t follow, Sandeep walked slowly up the stairs, his hand clutching the bannister.

  Hannah didn’t know what to think. Mo put his hand on her arm and said very gently. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine.’ She tried to smile.

  Then he turned to Rosa. ‘I’m sorry about that. He’s … he’s not himself.’ He looked suddenly very tired. ‘I realize all this – the storm, Rob’s death, my stupid keys – it’s a mess, but we can’t start accusing each other. We need to stick together.’

  Rosa’s face was pale. ‘Well there has to be an explanation,’ she said. ‘A reason for all these things going missing. Because it’s not just the car keys – it’s the food, too.’ She opened a cupboard and gestured to Mo. ‘Have you seen this?’

  He strode over and shifted a few of the tins on the shelf, as if everything else would be hidden behind them. ‘Jesus, it was half-full this morning.’ He opened the next cupboard and shook his head.

  ‘And the fridge and freezer are the same,’ Rosa said. Mo glanced into the fridge and then at Hannah, but she could only shrug.

  The windows rattled in their frames and even the walls seemed to shift in the wind. Rosa pulled out a chair and sat down with a thump. She put her head in her hands, sobbed, and then began to cry, very quietly, her body shaking. ‘I’m … sorry. It’s just, I don’t know where Liam is. And now this storm.’

  Chloe went to her, patting her back and telling her it would be all right, he would be back soon. Hannah noticed that Chloe’s hands were covered with scratches, presumably from the cat.

  ‘I don’t know about anyone else,’ Mo said. ‘But I’m hungry and we might as well eat what’s left.’

  He found crackers in one of the cupboards, a chunk of cheese and some grapes in the fridge and plonked them on the table with a pile of small plates. They all sat down in awkward silence, and Hannah picked at her food. Rosa still looked pale as she took an occasional sip of her apple juice.

  No one spoke until Mo filled another plate with food. ‘I’ll take this up to my dad.’ He was at the door, when he stopped. ‘What was that? Shh!’

  There was a scraping sound, like stone across stone. Then the shriek of an animal: a fox or a cat.

  A bang, followed by a thud and the crash of breaking glass.

  ‘Shit,’ said Mo.

  They stood in silence, listening to the wind. Then Lucy called from the top of the stairs. ‘Did you hear that noise? It came from outside.’

  Mo went into the hall, dropped his plate on a little table by the stairs and strode to the front door. But the wind was so fierce he struggled to open it.

  ‘Don’t, don’t go out there, please,’ Chloe said, and Hannah put her arm around her.

  Lucy joined them in the hall, helped Mo pull back the door, and followed him out into the rain.

  ‘Stay with your mum,’ Hannah said to Chloe, then ran after Lucy.

  The wind almost knocked her over as she stepped outside and tried to make her way along the side of the house. Her hair felt like stinging wire across her face. The grey-blue hills crouched on the horizon, dark purple in the gloom. Would the police be able to get here today? Would Liam return? She doubted it.

  As she turned the corner, her eyes streaming, she spotted Lucy and Mo sheltering beside the brick outhouse. When she got to them Lucy pointed to the greenhouse.

  ‘It’s a tile,’ she shouted. ‘Broke a pane of glass.’ The half-ruined greenhouse wasn’t far from the kitchen window, which explained why the smash had sounded so loud.

  Hannah shuffled towards it, her head bowed. She peered in through a broken pane of glass. A mess of broken flower pots and a dirt-encrusted trowel littered the shelf. Beside them an empty plastic compost bag swayed in the wind, waiting for a chance to lift off into the sky.

  Her gaze stopped on something else, lying on the floor.

  Something grey and still.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  She stepped carefully to the doorframe and slid her body inside the shell of the greenhouse, avoiding the broken glass. Above the wind she heard Lucy and Mo shouting her name, telling her to turn around.

  Tears prickled her eyes as she looked at the cat, lying broken and unmoving on the floor, its shining coat dulled by dust and bits of leaf blown in on the wind. She pushed the little rigid body with her toe. Mo and Lucy came to the door to stare in at her.

  ‘What is it?’ Mo said.

  ‘It’s dead.’ Hannah gestured to the cat.

  ‘Oh fuck,’ Lucy muttered.

  Mo pulled Hannah back outside. The three of them linked arms and gradually fought their way back to the house. Inside, the door slammed shut behind them and they stared at each other, breathing heavily.

  ‘Don’t tell Chloe,’ Hannah said.

  ‘It must have been hit by another tile,’ Mo whispered.
r />   There had been no tile or stone anywhere near it, but Hannah stayed silent.

  Rosa and Chloe appeared and Lucy told them what had happened to the greenhouse.

  ‘It was just a tile from the roof of the shed,’ Hannah said. ‘Nothing to worry about if we stay inside.’

  She imagined herself, trying to leave the house. Running out of the front door and sprinting along the path. A tile spiralling down from above and cracking into her skull. Hannah thudding to the ground, her hand stretched out to break her fall, blood pooling around her head.

  Chloe looked from Hannah to Mo and Lucy. ‘The police aren’t coming, are they?’

  ‘I doubt it,’ Mo said. ‘But they’ll be here tomorrow. And we’re safe in here.’ Hannah wondered if he really believed that.

  Chloe’s voice quivered. ‘And my dad … he won’t be back either, will he?’ She stared at Hannah. ‘I knew it, I just knew it. I told you he wouldn’t.’ There was a long pause.

  ‘He’ll be here,’ Mo said eventually. ‘As soon as the weather clears. You wait and—’

  ‘I don’t want to wait. I don’t want to stay here. I hate it, I hate this place.’ She ran up to her room, her feet thumping on the stairs. They heard the door slam, and then silence.

  Lucy laughed grimly. ‘Can’t say I blame her,’ she said.

  Rosa sighed and started walking up the stairs. ‘I shouldn’t leave her alone.’

  Hannah, Lucy, and Mo stood awkwardly in the hall for a moment. ‘It’s bloody freezing,’ said Hannah. ‘Is the heating even on?’

  ‘Let’s light the fire,’ Mo said. He tried to smile, but his face was pale.

  In the drawing room, Hannah went over to touch the radiator. It was cold. Stooping to twist the gauge, she realized it was on full. Behind her Mo and Lucy loaded logs onto the fire. She shivered and pulled her jumper closer, watching the rain lashing against the glass as she thought about the cat’s broken body lying out there in the storm.

  It wasn’t just what was going on in the house; it was the things happening to Hannah’s mind. Her talk with Lucy and the strange memories that kept flooding into her mind, the odd dreams that seemed so real, so vivid. And what was the other memory that seemed to linger at the edge of her consciousness?

  She went to sit on the sofa and Lucy plonked down beside her.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Lucy said.

  ‘I’m OK, just tired. And cold.’ She pointed at the radiator. ‘I think the heating’s broken.’

  Mo blew on the fire, the flames crackling. ‘It’s probably just the storm. Once we get this going properly, the house should warm up.’ He chucked on a log. ‘I’ll go and look for the boiler in a minute, see if I can get the heating back on.’

  ‘Well at least it’s not as cold as it could be,’ said Lucy. ‘It’s only autumn after all.’

  Mo slumped into an armchair and they all sat for a moment, watching the flames flickering in the hearth. Mo pulled out his phone and tapped away at the screen. ‘If only we could get the wifi working, find the router maybe, then we could get hold of the bloody host. He would know how to fix the heating.’

  They heard a rumble of thunder in the distance.

  ‘That’ll be the real storm,’ said Mo. ‘It’s only going to get worse.’

  Heavy footsteps were coming down the stairs. They turned to listen. The thud of someone running. Then the door flew open.

  Rosa stood framed by the light, her hair untidy, her face chalk-white. Her chest heaving, she reached out to the door for support.

  ‘Mo.’ She caught her breath. ‘Mo, you need to come upstairs.’

  ‘What, what is it? Are you OK?’ He got to his feet.

  ‘I said you need to come upstairs. Now.’

  Hannah and Lucy followed Mo into the hall, but Rosa shook her head at them and they could only look at Mo.

  ‘What is it?’ he said again.

  Rosa pointed. ‘Up there in his room. It’s Sandeep.’

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Mo sprinted up the stairs, before anyone else could speak. They listened to his footsteps thudding against floorboards. Then the sound of Sandeep’s door opening.

  ‘Dad?’ Just the one word before the door closed behind him. Rosa sighed and walked into the drawing room, shutting the door firmly and leaving Lucy and Hannah alone in the hall.

  They stood waiting, glancing at each other and wondering if this was some new drama dreamed up by Rosa. A clock ticked quietly somewhere nearby and, in the distance, thunder boomed across the hills.

  Lucy pulled Hannah away from the stairs. ‘Come on, leave it for now. Let’s talk to Rosa.’

  In the drawing room, Rosa was kneeling by the fire, her face red.

  ‘What happened?’ said Hannah gently. ‘Is Sandeep all right?’

  Rosa bowed her head and sobbed.

  ‘Is he OK?’ asked Lucy.

  ‘He’s dead.’ It was almost a shout.

  Nobody said anything for a while. Hannah felt a sharp pain in her throat and she eased herself onto the sofa, trying to keep from breaking down completely. Chloe burst in the room, crying loud desperate tears, and ran to her mother. She pressed her face into Rosa’s shoulder and the two of them knelt like that by the fire, sobbing.

  Lucy sat carefully next to Hannah, her blue eyes wide, her face pale.

  Eventually Rosa looked around at them. ‘I … I saw him. I went to see if he wanted food, wanted to make up with him after earlier.’ She wiped her eyes with a sleeve. ‘But he didn’t answer, so I pushed open the door and … it’s true. He’s gone.’

  Hannah stood up and went back into the hall. He couldn’t be dead, surely he couldn’t be dead. She waited, listening, at the bottom of the stairs. If Mo was still in his father’s room, he was making no sound. She walked up, her feet dragging, willing this all to be one of her nightmares, willing Rosa to have made some kind of mistake. But she knew Sandeep had been ill, knew his cough had been worsening, and heart attacks or strokes could happen with no warning.

  She took a breath and tapped gently on the door. No response. Tapped again and called very quietly, ‘Mo? Are you all right?’

  She stood there for long minutes and was about to turn away, when the door opened. The glow from the lamp inside shrouded Mo’s face in shadow, making him almost unrecognizable. His eyes glinted with dark fire.

  He let the door fall completely open and Hannah put a hand to her mouth. She could make out a shape in the bed, a mound under the duvet that wasn’t moving. They stepped inside.

  Sandeep lay there fully dressed, the light from the lamp playing over his face – his head on the pillow, a trail of drool glittering across his cheek.

  It was obvious he was dead.

  A sound from Mo, a groan that seemed to come from somewhere deep inside him. He stepped forward and knelt by the bed, sobs moving through him like waves. Hannah felt her own tears falling, trickling down her cheeks, as she crouched to hold him.

  They stayed like that for a few moments, his head on her shoulder, just like Rosa and Chloe downstairs. Statues of shock and grief. She let his head rest, breathing in time with him, knowing nothing she could say or do could help him now.

  Eventually she broke free and stood up, went to flick the light switch by the door. The bulb flickered and came on, shining light into every corner of the room. Sandeep’s paper-thin skin looked almost translucent. On the bedside table she saw an array of plastic containers full of pills, empty blister packs that must have once contained tablets. And something else. An empty vodka bottle, its lid beside it. Her empty vodka bottle.

  Mo stood up and pulled his phone from his pocket, his bloodshot eyes wide, his mouth twisted. ‘Have you got signal? Can you check? We need a doctor.’ When she didn’t respond, he shouted. ‘Hannah!’

  She blinked, pulled out her phone, struggling to see the screen through her tears. No signal and hardly any battery. She shook her head.

  ‘For God’s sake.’ Mo went to the door. ‘Anyone!’ he shouted do
wn the stairs. ‘Lucy, Rosa! Help!’ His voice echoed around the corridors and into the empty wing of the house, where it seemed to go on reverberating. ‘Anyone have signal? We need a doctor!’ His chest heaved as Rosa poked her head out of the drawing room, shut the door firmly behind her and came up the stairs.

  ‘Please, Mo, you’ve got to calm down,’ she said when she reached the landing. ‘None of us have signal, you know that. And you’re frightening Chloe.’

  ‘For fuck sake, are you joking? Have you seen him? Look at him.’ He pointed at his father’s dead body. ‘He needs help.’

  Rosa’s hand went to his sleeve, but he shook it off and she stepped back to join Hannah against the far wall.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mo, I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘There’s nothing to be done. I was a nurse, you know. I had a good look at him – checked his pulse – before I called you.’

  She paused. ‘It’s … it’s far too late. He’s dead, he’s been dead for a while.’ She glanced at Hannah, then back to Mo. ‘You’ve had a shock. Why don’t you go downstairs? Hannah can make you a cup of tea. I’d better get back to Chloe.’

  Mo stood stock still as she slipped past him and headed down the stairs and into the drawing room.

  Eventually Hannah said, ‘Mo?’ and he looked at her blankly, as if he had never seen her before.

  ‘Mo,’ she said again.

  ‘It’s my fault.’ He swallowed. ‘I should never have brought him here. Why did I persuade him to stay? Even after everything he said about this fucking place, even after he told me he needed to go home.’

  Hannah stepped closer. ‘You’re not to blame.’ She reached out to touch his shoulder.

  He let her hand rest there for a second or two, but then he turned, face contorted with anger, knocking it away. Hannah stepped back against the wall again and Mo towered over her.

  ‘Not to blame? Of course I’m to blame. I didn’t bother to check on him properly. And the last memory he has of his son is me calling him paranoid. Can you imagine?’

  This violent man was nothing like the Mo she thought she had begun to know. He grabbed one of the empty blister packs.